Harry Potter: Gathering
by Neighpony
Summary: HIATUS/UPFORGRABS It’s the end of 5th year, a depressed Harry allows himself to partake in something he would never have condoned. Too ashamed to see his friends, too jaded and scared about his fate in the wizarding world – he ran.
1. Guilt is part of life

**Gathering**

**Disclaimer: **Hardly necessary is it? Whatever – I don't own the rights, whatnot and etc's of Harry Potter, blah, blah, yada, yada bip.

**Summary:**It's the end of 5th year, a depressed Harry allows himself to partake in something he would never have condoned. Too ashamed to see his friends, too jaded and scared about his fate in the wizarding world – he ran.

**Warnings: **slashish, rapeish (somewhere in between) language… maybe, just generally not for children, or those that can't tolerate those kinds of things. They can just turn off the internet and climb back under their rocks for all I care.

Harry lay on his bed at number 4 Private Drive, waiting. He was waiting for something, though exactly what he wasn't sure. He was waiting for energy to move, even just inclination, waiting for someone to send him news of something but then he didn't really pay much attention when they did. Most of all he was waiting for his guilt to wash away, for the day when he could just get out of bed and not think, 'my godfather is dead, because of me'. That day had yet to come and so he still lay there waiting, thinking about what he was, what he thought he was, what he really wasn't… and tears ran down his face but he didn't cry out because he was just too sad, too utterly spent to bother. The harsh reality of what he'd done, what he hadn't done and what he realised now he simply couldn't do, was just that – too harsh, and he wasn't coping.

The order was doing their best to help him, he knew they loved him and he loved them back, but that didn't change the way his stomach seemed to sit exponentially below his body, stealing any interest he may have had in food. He was becoming the physical manifestation of the way he felt – sick. He was tired and he wanted to hide away in bed, he didn't want to get up anymore, didn't want to face the world. Always so fickle, he was loved by the masses again but now he didn't want to be, he knew he was going to fail them and a vindictive part of him wanted to. He wanted to hurt them all, show them what it was like to have to suffer, like they had done to him, like they had done to Sirius…

However, he knew he could never and that just made him feel worse, he was a coward, too scared to screw the world over for his own ends and it made him angry at himself. Then as always a part of him wanted to help everyone, but still he knew now, that he was incapable, always had been, and he was going to fail them – and it hurt, to feel powerless and know that there was nothing he could do.

So he stayed in bed, away from the world – so what if he was going to fail them? There was no need for him to announce it _now_. He was putting off the moment when he would have to show himself to the world as a weakling. Harry knew that Sirius would not have wanted him to grieve so about his death but it was so much more then that and it didn't matter how many people clucked over him and said, 'it wasn't _really_ his fault', and 'Sirius would have wanted to go out with a bang. He would have wanted you to be happy' and of course the one that now irked him the most 'of course you can do it, you've done so much'. That was perhaps the problem – he had done so many things, good and bad, but what for?

What was he fighting for? Who was he fighting? Voldemort? He used to think so, and that made sense – he fought Voldemort because he killed his parents… but it wasn't like he was the first child to lose his parents, and he'd never wanted to do anything to car companies, or government road bodies, back when he thought his parents had been killed in a car accident. So why did he go after Voldemort, and why did everyone encourage him to? Well Voldemort _had _gone after him first… except he hadn't; Voldemort had seen fit to disregard the prophecy and offer him power back in his first year, but now… He had made a nuisance of himself and given Voldemort every reason to go after him, in fact, if anything he had become like a mosquito to Voldemort, he made a lot of annoying noise but generally Voldemort only bothered to make an effort to kill him if he came within arms reach.

So surely now, Harry should think to stop getting in his way, he'd lost everything – twice! Surely, people should be telling him to leave things alone… but they weren't, Dumbledore had told him now that there was a prophecy that said he **had **to kill Voldemort and Harry didn't like it. It was one thing when he was sitting in Dumbledore's office listening to his reassurance that this was not something he had to do, but deep down it was something he wanted to do. That was something Harry just could not get his head around – deep down he'd always wanted to be a murderer…and everyone was happy about that? Somewhere along the lines, he'd missed something…

As much as he thought about things, he couldn't bring himself to care, partly because he refused to accept any thoughts of reality. Some mornings he would wake up and think to write a letter to Sirius and for all of about two minutes, things would be normal again, but then the giant foot would come down and kick his stomach back into it's now usual resting place – reality sucked for Harry, so he spent hours in a half-asleep daze, neither here nor there.

Hours turned into days, days turned into weeks, until eventually he found himself staring dully down at the yellowing parchment that had just been brought to him by a proud tawny owl. He opened the letter with little enthusiasm and his eyes scanned straight to the signature – Dumbledore.

"Shit", Harry exclaimed, scanning the letter quickly, "shit, shit, shit" he cursed under his breath as he turned to look in the mirror. Dumbledore was coming to pick him up tonight and he looked like the living dead, in fact he smelt like the 'dead' dead.

'Oh fuck' he thought staring into the mirror as he flung off his tattered grey shirt. It landed in a pile on the floor, his aunt could deal with it, most likely it would be incinerated. The good thing about not changing one's clothes for several weeks was that he had no need to pack his suitcase, as it had never been opened. The bad thing was, it didn't have the best effects on the clothes he had been wearing.

The grey shirt had sweat stains around the underarms, testament to the reach of a particularly blaring summer's heat. His worn jeans were stained where he had dropped soup on them, one of the few times he had brought himself to eat, and they smelt, they just stunk… actually he stunk, all over, he was a mess. His skin was white, his hair was so greasy it stood up much more firmly then usual and it was still quite shaggy – his aunt wouldn't have been able to look at him, his eyes were dead and his glasses did nothing to hide it. He glanced quickly around the room, apart from the bed which appeared as festering as himself, it was fine, practically spotless. He glanced back in the mirror and decided a shower was probably the best he could do.

xxXxx

Stepping out of the shower sometime later, Harry dried himself quickly and wrapped the towel around his waist. Staring into a mirror once again, the results were not so different. His eyes were still dead and his skin was still white, his hair at least looked better and he generally smelt much better. Overall however, his look remained the same. He was thin, not a skeleton, but he had past the description of 'peaky'. He looked… fragile, and like all young males, he was not happy about it, but it was far from the top of his 'reasons to go back to bed' list.

With a sigh, he made his way out of the bathroom, having to stop abruptly to avoid a collision with Dudley and his friend Piers, who were no doubt making their way to Dudley's room to try out his latest Playstation game. Dudley gave him a nod and went on his way, Piers however was looking at him with a smirk.

"Well, well, well Big-D, you never said how big little Harry had gotten" he said mockingly, his smirk widening at the glowering look Harry gave him.

"Leave him P", said Dudley, trying to sound uninterested. Harry took the opportunity to walk away from the pair of them and into his room. He tried to shut the door but found Piers was stopping it from closing.

"Just leave him Piers, he doesn't do anything", Dudley said as he tried to get Piers to let go of the door. Piers brushed him off and edged his way further into Harry's room. Harry meanwhile was keeping out of arms reach of the pair of them.

"Piss off Dudley, don't get your knickers in a knot. We're just gonna have a conversation of… like interests", he said cheerfully.

"I don't think he shares your interests P" Dudley said more forcefully, "Just leave him alone."

"I wouldn't know **D**" Piers said getting equally more forceful, "because you're gettin' in the way of our **conversation**"

"Look Piers that's my cousin, just leave him alone" Dudley said in a voice of finality.

"Dudley, I got so much dirt on you I could start my own landscaping business. Now if you don't get in your room and put the stereo on right now I just might, know what I mean? We're just going to talk, you needn't fret mother" He said giving Dudley a final push out the door before shutting it firmly. Dudley lingered there for a second before seeming to decide Harry could look after himself and heading to his room where he turned his music on quite loud.

"Finally" said Piers after he was sure Dudley had gone "I thought lardmuffin would never leave" he finished as he walked his way slowly towards Harry who was standing in front of his wooden wardrobe.

"What do you want Piers" asked Harry standing up straight, trying to sound bored and look a lot bigger then he felt with Dudley's huge well muscled boxing friend towering into his personal space.

"Oh so many things" Piers whispered as he continued his way across the creaking floorboards, effectively backing Harry slowly against the wardrobe. A fact he remained unaware of until his back hit the smooth wooden panel. He breathed in sharply at the shock of it, and then had to force himself not to repeat the action when he refocused and realised Piers' whole body was barely an inch away from his. He never thought the day would come when he wouldn't be happy that someone didn't want to hurt him, but right at that moment, when everything was getting so utterly bewildering, he hoped desperately that Piers was going to sock him in the face. When did anything ever go his way though?

A/N: Spur of the moment thing, it's 1am, this hasn't been checked or anything like that yet but I just wrote it so I wanted to post it now…

In other things A/N – rant time, I'm sick of people not reviewing my stories, it's annoying. If you can read then I hope you have the ability to type but perhaps not. Previous story of mine, 'Caged': currently 888 hits, 2 c2s, 6 favs, 3 alerts and a whopping grand total of 6 reviews. So, I'm a bit of a writer, I have a bit of a vocabulary, so here's three words: indolent, obtuse, abhor.

If you got this far and you're thinking you wont review – why don't you just pick one of those words and copy/paste it into the review box. Then I'll know if your not reviewing is because you don't feel like it, because you're literacy talents render you incapable of it, or if you simply detest my story and I.

Rant complete – though I reserve the right to remain on the bandwagon.

Katty xx


	2. Teens are prone to overreact

**Gathering**

****

**Warnings Strongly Apply: **slashish, rapeish (somewhere in between) language… maybe, just generally not for children, or those that can't tolerate those kinds of things. They can just turn off the internet and climb back under their rocks for all I care.

A/N: I had every intention of updating Once Again… but it's written on a different computer, sooo, rather then ignore the call to write, I decided to update the unreviewed story…

xXx

Everything seemed to slow down as Piers' face got closer and closer to his, but still in denial, Harry didn't move, he simply couldn't concede that a **boy **was about to kiss him. It seemed to take an eternity before their lips connected. Shocked, Harry pushed him away with all his force and spluttering, made a break for the door. Piers grabbed him before he could turn the knob and slammed his body against the wooden doorframe. Some of Dudley's old toys fell from a shelf across the room and clunked onto the floor. It could have been because of the impact of his body into the door, but in Harry's mind a switch seemed to flick and all it said was 'no more chances, if you use magic, they will expel you'. With this thought, even through all of his sheer panic, something inside of him seemed to shut his magic off. And he was powerless again.

Harry hit Piers with every physical weapon he had, which didn't amount to much considering the way Piers' body dwarfed his. His attempts to make noise were cut off by the foul mouth covering his, completely alien to the warmth, strawberry-ness and sheer femineity of what he had experienced with Cho previously. He had tried to save his towel from falling to the floor but the lips on his were just so wrong, he couldn't help but devote all his spare hands to the task of removing them. Harry went for the eyes, as if Piers was a dragon and they, his only weakness. But this was not school, there were no dragons and certainly no broomsticks – this was real and he was trapped.

Angrily, Piers swatted his hands away. In retribution he managed to grab both Harry's wrists in one hand and wrenched them well above his head, holding them there so that even attempts to move the rest of his body would cause the stretched limbs more discomfort. Harry of course, ignored this and continued to throw his body into trying to keep a less than intimate distance between himself and the Hungarian rhinoceros that had him trapped against his own bedroom door.

He may have been shocked, but he wasn't scared, wasn't embarrassed he wasn't even angry. He was feeling something though, and by-gods he felt alive again. It was fairly indescribable, more thought then actual feeling. A desire to fight for survival, reminiscent of his days before magic, when he only had himself to rely on and he lived his life purely on the will to be alive. It didn't matter to him in that moment, if he was going to get beaten up, the blood was flowing in his veins once more and he was determined to fight.

He twisted his back around to try and stop Piers' wandering other hand from gaining any private contact, this only caused him to chuckle though and wedge their bodies more firmly together, giving Harry no penchant to move. Harry reused to be beaten and brought his foot down hard on the cool wood floor several times, eventually making contact with Piers' unclad foot. He gave a grunt and slammed his knee into Harry's thigh, trying to reprimand him and keep him still.

Harry gasped at the momentary numbing pain in his leg, and stumbled as much as one who is pinned to a wall could at the blow. He didn't even notice that Piers' hands had found their target and were pulling with matriculate expertise, not until Piers started to flatten their bodies together and grind his hips into Harry's.

Then Harry realised. Then Harry started to fight in sheer unadulterated panic, still it got him nowhere, panic only served to shut off any intelligent senses other than 'flail madly' and that was helping him none.

'Wrong, wrong, wrong' was all his mind screamed at him, 'Sirius wouldn't be able to look at me, Dumbledore will disown me. I'll disgust them all. Everyone's going to hate me again.' Sometime during this helpless, self pitying rant a strange feeling, sort of like butterflies, except inexplicably better had begun to build up in the bottom of his stomach and he began to think that maybe it wasn't so wrong, that it wasn't like he was going to tell anyone and so no one would even know anyway. Really it wasn't like he planned to do it again and once couldn't really hurt and he needed to move his hips as well, plus he had an unexplainable desire to mouth something… it may as well be Piers' mouth…

Harry let go of everything for the first time in his life, he didn't think he'd ever felt this carefree, certainly not since his first year in the wizarding world, that was for sure. He wondered if this was what he had been supposed to do in occulmency, he didn't think so though because his mind wasn't exactly 'clear', it was just utterly and tenaciously focused on getting one thing… and he didn't even know what, but instinct told him if he sucked hard enough at Piers' skin and moved his hips to grind against anything solid, that his butterflies would build up… and he guessed maybe that's what he wanted. The fact that his brain couldn't focus on anything except accumulating butterflies led him to think that was probably a good assumption.

He had no idea how or when they ended up on the lumpy bed. When Piers moved so that Harry couldn't mouth anything he was slightly put out, but then a wetness enveloped him and he was mouthing thin air without really being able to place what he had wanted anyway. He was bucking madly and Piers had to put a hand over his mouth to stop him yelling out, then all of a sudden it was as if the butterflies had exploded out and he was left nearly blissfully unconscious with his eyes rolled almost into the back of his head, breathing as if he had run from the dungeons to the Astronomy Tower.

Piers didn't remove his hand though, and Harry who felt as if he was coming back through a pleasant haze briefly wondered why, seeing as he was done making noise. Then he paused longer to wonder why Piers would be interested in doing something so selflessly pleasurable for him, he wasn't quite coherent enough to really philosophise it yet though. So it was that a half aware Harry looked quizzically down towards the overloaded barrel of one Piers Polkiss, wondering exactly what he wanted him to do with it.

Apparently Piers had plans for it all along and the pleasant haze Harry had been slowly descending through turned into a thick sludge that he was madly trying to beat away to identify the source of his brain's question – 'Why. Is. My. Arse. On. Fire?

However it took even less time before he began questioning what problem he had ever had with fire… and really he liked fire, wanted to light more fire, build fire like butterflies – that seemed like a good idea, he started to buck madly again until he managed to buck himself onto a white light and he hit it so hard his ears were ringing and his muscles were quivering and for all the world he might have been senseless. Piers wasn't even half done with him though, he hit that blinding light twice again in the whole process before he gruntingly found his own release and removed himself from Harry, who was a quivering, goofy-smiling, mass of jelly on the bed. He was barely even cognent as Piers got dressed and patted him condescendingly on the cheek with a "good boy" before he walked out into the hallway as if nothing had happened.

To Harry it seemed like a long time before his heart stopped racing and his breathing returned to normal, probably it was only a few minutes before he started to reacquaint himself with the dangers of fire and all of his prior protests sprang to mind once more. He was gripped by a panic possibly worse then he had felt before as he came back into the realisation of exactly what he had let happen.

His mind raced, 'what have I done? What have I done? How am I going to explain this? I'm not going to; I won't tell them no one ever has to know… But they will know. Dumbledore will take one look at me and he'll be able to tell and the Weasley's… crap the Weasleys' won't ever want to be near me again'.

Basically, Harry's hyperventilating; panicking mind brought itself to the conclusion that what he had done was a betrayal worse then spying for Voldemort and absolutely everyone was going to find out about it as soon as Dumbledore saw him.

So he wouldn't see Dumbledore. He was going to be killed by Voldemort eventually anyway, so he might as well just get it over with and hope for some good faith on Voldemort's part to destroy the evidence, and then no one would ever find out what he did, and they could all just remember him as he'd been – brave and noble… At least, that was what he'd always been to them.

He moved methodically as he prepared to leave, though he didn't know it, he was in shock, yet currently he remained emotionless as he got up and went to the bathroom. He was still naked but he didn't even notice while he picked the bleach out from under the sink counter and proceeded back to his room. He poured it over the blood stain on the bed and rubbed it in with his hands until the stain was no longer visible and there was nothing left on the bed that could identify what had taken place. He stripped the mattress before flipping it over and leaving it bare. He knew the harsh bleach would probably eat it away, but there would be nobody to care after today he told himself before he picked up the sheets and went to the bathroom once again.

His hands were stinging painfully by the time he had dropped the sheets into the laundry basket and stepped into the shower for the second time that day. Things were starting to catch up to him at this stage and he shook as he scrubbed his skin raw. He waited, scrubbing in the shower until he was sure his sore behind had stopped bleeding, he still had bruises though in hard to explain places and could only pray that Voldemort would honour his last request.

Harry stepped out of the shower smelling like lavender and roses, towelling himself quickly he returned to his room and dressed in his best Dursley clothes. He shut his window as a way of releasing Hedwig who had been out since sometime the previous day, neither of them, he thought to himself as he made his way out of the house, would ever need to be entering that room again.

A/N: Another chapter... hope y'all liked.

Now I know at least 5 of you probably aren't stupid enough to need this, but still you'll be the ones that understand why I'm saying this then. There's a little called characterization, which basically means that just because I choose to try and display a possible angle of cannonistic Harry Potter having a bad reaction to a gay relationship and not saying "why yes Piers, let us play naked bang-bang and be joyous", does **not** mean that I myself am homophobic.

ok? farham?

Next chapter, Voldemort laughs in his face... but then what?

Katty xx


	3. Overreactions will lead to regret

**Gathering**

**Warnings Strongly Apply:** sex and swearing... We're talking about a 15yr old here people...

A/N: Wow - all wither before the power of procastination... At least there's certainly nothing in my willpower you need to wither from, because obviously - it's not particularly strong...

xXx

There seemed to be a chill in the summer breeze as Harry began jogging away from the house. It stung his face and made his eyes water and his skin shiver, although, he thought as he let out a sobbed breath, the breeze may not have been to blame. Footsteps echoed his movements somewhere behind him, but no one called to him and he wondered if he was being paranoid, or if there was someone who had been watching him yet again. If there was, they probably already knew what happened, his anxious mind told him. A louder, angrier voice reminded him that if they knew and did nothing, then they were as much to fault as he.

Either way, Harry ran faster. He was afraid of death but he refused to think about what he was running towards because he was too concerned with all the mistakes and things he was running away from. In his mind the only thought that had become clear was that Voldemort would solve all of his problems, Harry didn't care how or why but still, he knew that he would.

So he opened up his mind and screamed into it, trying to open something that he knew was there, but didn't know how to get to. He called and called and called for Voldemort as he wove his way through the back streets of Little Whinging, making sure he lost the tail that may or may not have been there.

His breath was rasping as he arrived in his usual haunt, the yellowing and deserted children's playground. Harry let out a sigh of relief at the pop of apparition and the imposing silhouette that signalled the Dark Lord had answered his call. It turned into a strangled, frustrated cry though as many other pops announced the arrival of the rest of his death eaters.

"Can't you ever do anything without a fucking audience?" Harry yelled furiously like a petulant child.

To his credit, Voldemort didn't even bat an eyelash as he approached; he just lifted a questioning eyebrow at Harry's wet face and rasping breath and smiled as he tsk'd mockingly.

"Harry, Harry, Harry – Language. What _has_ gotten the boy-who-lived so worked up? Perhaps I need to get Dumbledore for you?" He asked causing chuckles among the otherwise very confused death-eaters.

"I want to deal with you alone" Harry bit out forcefully.

"But surely Harry, anything you have to say to me, you can say in front of my most trusted family." Voldemort said, spreading his arms to encompass his followers standing jauntily behind him.

'No', thought Harry, 'I can't, because that would devoid the point.' Realising the need for a fast change of tact, Harry shot back pompously,

"I challenge you to a duel; winner must cremate the loser's corpse" he said, causing curious twitters amongst the death-eaters.

"You don't want to duel Harry Potter." Voldemort whispered conspiratorially, "You want to die, and you want me to kill you – Why?" he asked threateningly.

"Why do you always have to be so fucking paranoid?" Harry growled angrily "This has nothing to do with that stupid prophecy! It's not some trick to kill you! You're the one who reckons I have a fucking hero complex so why the hell can't I just want to fight you?"

Voldemort whipped his hand across the space between them in the blink of an eye and latched threatening fingers around Harry's neck.

"Because you're lying about something…Those muggles have given you a dirty mouth Harry. Don't you know the appropriate way to act?" Voldemort questioned domineeringly as he gripped a limp Harry's throat.

For a second Harry's breath hitched and his heart skipped a beat before it started racing again as he thought Voldemort was referring to something else, and he **knew** but he couldn't possibly… Then Harry realised he was talking about his bad language and tried to get a hold of himself. It was too late however; Voldemort had noticed his panic and was smiling curiously.

"What did you do Harry?" He whispered audibly with a wide smirk.

"PISS OFF!" Harry yelled furiously "It's none of your business 'why'. I'm standing here, giving you what you've hounded me for the last 15 years to get and you won't even do one little thing for me! **Fine**" he said, annoyed as he tried to unsuccessfully push Voldemort's hand off of his neck. "If you won't kill me and burn me right now, then I'm leaving. I don't have time to dick around with your mind games."

"Why the rush Harry? You need to be somewhere afterwa – Dumbledore!" he concluded triumphantly. "You've done something and you don't want him to know, do you Harry?" Voldemort said with cheerful intrigue.

"**Shut up**!" Harry spat as he tried to pry Voldemort's fingers away from his neck. It was only then that Voldemort noticed Harry wasn't actually suffering anything but restraint from his grasp and logically, that had to do something with love. What exactly, he wasn't sure.

"I notice Harry, you're not screaming" he said conversationally.

"YOU'RE THE MOST ARROGANT BASTAR-" Harry started screaming, once more misinterpreting what Voldemort meant, but he was abruptly cut off when Voldemort stroked from his scar down the side of his still-wet face, smirking pointedly. However it was Voldemort who ended up shocked by Harry's reaction. He saw the fear light in his eyes at the intimate contact and then Harry just dropped. He didn't struggle, he just dropped to the ground, he looked betrayed at Voldemort's actions but more then that, he was terrified and he was being submissive.

"Don't" Harry pleaded, a sob wrenching from his body. Of all the people, why Voldemort? Honestly they had the simplest relationship of anyone in Harry's life – one would kill the other, so what was he playing at? If Harry was being just a tad paranoid about contact with men right now, then he figured in the case of Voldemort he would rather err on the side of caution so as to avoid the butterflies betraying his rationale again.

Meanwhile, the death eaters were twittering and chuckling as they stood behind Voldemort. Having, as they did, no real clue as to what was going on, the fear Potter displayed was something they recognised and craved to see. Voldemort on the other hand was trying very hard to contain his shock at a submissive Harry to his widened eyes and set mouth.

He bent to try and grab a hold of Harry again, who was doing his best to scoot away from him while muttering half formed requests of 'no', 'don't' and 'please just leave me alone'.

"Alright Harry, no more games" he said matter-of-factly as he whipped out his wand.

xXx

A/N: Well, really that's not exactly a finished chapter.. but that's where I got up to and figured - meh, might as well post tonight.

For any that assumed I was being a tad specific when I said 5 of you will be smart or whatever... yeah, actually there was a percent sign there, and while I'm trying to avoid ranting I would still just like to point out that a pros...titute is a profession, not a derogatory word in need of censoring.

So... as far as the story's concerned:

Parseltonge girl - Whether or not he was raped depends on your definition of rape. I'm leaving it to everyone to make their own decision because to generalise there could be very upsetting for some. Plus the whole point of his guilt for it is that he doesn't really know either.

I like to think my writing has matured, last chapter was my graduation into the realms of lemon... can't say it wasn't tricky when you're the kind of person that laughs if someone says penis... but I think it worked out alright...

My main goal for the moment with this story is to try and keep people in character, as opposed the OC atrocity that is Voldemort in 'Caged'. I draw a line however between being oc and being realistic... so if you're of the opinion that a swearing Harry is oc, I'm of the opinion that a non-swearing Harry is not realistic to his age and cirumstances, censorship is something that exists to sell children's books (that's a bit of an over-generalisation, but you know what I mean).

Thanks to my reviewers - **parseltonge girl** and **panther73110**

Katty xx


	4. You cannot find what isn't lost

**Gathering**

**Warnings ... this story has some...**

**A/N:** Ok so maybe it's just 'Once Again' that has hit a brick wall... Well that and a 2000 word physiology assignment...

* * *

Disappointment washed through Harry at Voldemort's words. For all that he was ready to die he had always imagined (at least since he was 11) that he would go in a particular way… Really it wasn't even that particular, he'd just rather be standing up tall, as opposed to crying at Voldemort's feet. Beggars can't be choosers he supposed as he brought his eyes up to meet his killer's… or was it his releasor's? 

A minute flick of Voldemort's wrist knocked his hands out behind him and he landed with an 'oomph' on his back. Voldemort was quick to get a foot on his chest to keep him in his place as he pointed his wand point blank at Harry's nose. Harry sighed in defeat and frustration; it was so like Voldemort to make sure he couldn't die with any dignity, he had to be lying in the dirt of a dusty muggle park under the foot of the 'great' Dark Lord. He wouldn't let him have the last laugh though Harry thought wryly and smiled at Voldemort as if he was relaxed. He should have been more worried when Voldemort returned his smile with vindictive pleasure, but it was a look Harry had come to know on that face and he just watched as Voldemort's lips started to form a spell – too late he realised it was the wrong spell.

"Legilimens" Voldemort whispered, a chuckle escaping his lips as the horrible shock of realisation passed over Harry's face. He entered the boy's mind and straight away discovered exactly what he most wanted to hide. Though he had a very thorough look to make sure, if it was anyone but Potter he would have assumed he was receiving a target memory through occulmency… but Harry had managed to grow up with such naïve views on what 'love' pertained and so readily accepted any fault piled on him that it made sense, in a ridiculous way, that sullying his view of love could drive him to suicide. Also, the fact that Potter was screaming blue murder on the ground and remained obviously hopeless at defending his mind was a bit of a give away too.

Smiling haughtily, Voldemort removed the spell from Harry but was soon shocked to find himself stumbling to the ground as Harry the human cannon ball collided strongly with his waist.

"IT WAS NONE OF YOUR BUSINESS" Harry screamed hoarsely, his voice breaking as he pounded his fists against Voldemort's chest. It was Snape who came to his master's rescue and delivered a swift kick to the side of Harry's head, effectively rolling him back over on to his back where he stayed. Whatever had happened to Harry was obviously bad the boy was in such a sad, pathetic state the dour potions master actually felt ill.

"You didn't need to know!" Harry cried furiously as Voldemort rose quickly back to his feet, brushing off attempts of assistance from his death eaters. His face a mask of fury as he pointed his wand once again at Harry and said malevolently,

"Crucio" Harry didn't even really scream as Voldemort held the curse for over a minute, he just made a funny keening noise somewhere between a wail and a cry… it seemed as if he was too upset to feel pain, but Voldemort never was one to put much stock in emotions.

He lifted the spell and left Harry panting on the ground with his hands covering his face, just sobbing quietly to himself now.

"Get him on his feet" Voldemort spat the command and two of his more Neanderthal-like death eaters moved to follow his demand and bodily lifted Harry to his feet, keeping him up with a firm grip under each armpit, Harry focused determinedly on the ground as tears continued to well in his eyes and fall into the drought-ridden brown dust.

Even when Voldemort reached under his chin and pulled his face up, Harry refused to meet his eyes. Voldemort let out a short, mirthless chuckle.

"Tell me Harry" he began pleasantly, "for I have not often had to deal with stubborn children other then yourself. When I have taken over Hogwarts and this government, your friends, who have always remained as foolishly stubborn as yourself, do you think I can use this same method to teach them subservience? It is quite a pleasurable method is it not?" he finished, smiling in a mock-friendly manor.

Harry didn't answer him, he didn't want to let Voldemort bait him, and more then that as he found himself held nose to chin with Lord Voldemort, he knew he couldn't have gotten the words past his attempts to stop sobbing anyway.

"Never mind Harry" said Voldemort kindly. "I can answer that for you. Seeing as you seem to be so unusually quiet" the death eaters around them chuckled. "There is no one quite like you Harry, even I would never have thought of such a simple thing to break you. I admit myself surprised that you would expect your great and gracious headmaster to discard you for-"

"SHUT UP" screamed Harry over the top of him, causing an amused glint in Voldemort's eye. It only grew as several pops of apparition announced the arrival of Dumbledore and his order. Harry's shoulders slumped, he looked absolutely defeated and he stared focusing his entire being at the ground, but in his head he knew it was too late, that Dumbledore had seen him and that everyone he had ever cared about would know that he was an abomination. He still didn't want Voldemort to say it out loud though.

"Ah Dumbledore how good of you to join us" Voldemort said with mock joy. "I think Harry has some issues he'd like to sort out with you before he goes, wouldn't you Harry?" he asked conversationally. "You wouldn't have any information to add about why I need to kill him would you? A certain prophecy perhaps?" He added addressing Dumbledore cheerfully.

"Release him Tom. It is me you seek to prove yourself against." Dumbledore commanded, power radiating from him. Order members and death eaters alike stood nervously behind their calm leaders like a pack of wild dogs awaiting the fall.

"Oh no Dumbledore, I have nothing at all that requires further proof. The evidence that your purist teachings of 'love' are wrong stand shaking before me" Voldemort replied, grabbing Harry's head and stroking his cheek as he fought to bring him to look at Dumbledore, shushing the boy as he struggled against the unspoken command. Harry stilled however, as his eyes eventually caught Dumbledore's now also tear filled orbs. Once more he misinterpreted the situation and assumed that Dumbledore was 'that' upset with him, so he turned his head away again, this time Voldemort allowing him to, Harry's sobbing face somehow ending up hidden in his chest.

Voldemort only let it rest there for a second, long enough to horrify Dumbledore and completely baffle the order members. Then he stepped smoothly away, leaving Harry's tear tracked face to hang pathetically. Not one death eater had released even an ounce of a chuckle at their enemies down fall, they had passed beyond confused the moment Potter appeared more scared of Dumbledore then he did of Voldemort.

"One day Tom, you will be held accountable for your crimes." Said Dumbledore in the coldest, angriest voice anyone had ever heard from him as he drew his wand.

"As will you Dumbledore, but graciously I admit, that this one" he gestured at the broken Harry, smiling dangerously "is all yours" he finished coldly, laughing as Dumbledore threw the first curse.

It was a brilliant light show, vastly different from the jousting competition of over a month ago. There was no words shared between the two, one was driven by pure rage the other by pure hate. It took a minute or so before their watching followers realised that the fight had begun. It was a minute or so more before Harry realised no one was holding him anymore. He ran far, far away when he did.

The fight itself did not last very long, it ended in a tense stalemate when both parties realised that the object of their efforts was quite gone. There were injuries on both sides, but no real damage had been done this time, they all lived to fight another day. Voldemort, surprisingly never told anyone what he had seen in Harry's mind and although Severus had his suspicions, there was not enough to lead the order towards any evidence. No one but Voldemort and Harry Potter knew why he had disappeared. This was exactly what he had managed to do – disappear.

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A/N: The end... nah, this story will perhaps take an unexpected direction, certainly not unheard of but probably unexpected... can anbody guess who/where he's going to end up?

Thanks to my reviewers last chapter: **Blackmusasabi **and **parseltonge girl**

Katty xx


	5. In every insecurity there is hope

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**AN: **Well it's neither a particularly long, nor interesting update - but it is an update! soooo... yay!

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It seemed as if Harry had been running for a long time, truthfully he didn't know how long or how far he'd gone, but when he saw a sign that suggested he was heading towards Reading, he decided to stop and actually think. Some things he had decided – he didn't want to die and he didn't want to be a wizard anymore. For all that it had seemed like a grand opportunity to an 11 year old, for all the money and all the security – it was killing him slowly, eating away his strengths, finding new insecurities, turning him into something he was never supposed to be. He just wanted a normal life where no one knew him. Harry knew that he would never have a normal life, that was just fact, but he could find anonymity. He supposed there were two options for this; one, he headed to a new town, looked for work, built himself a new life from the ground up. Of course the problem with this option is that everyone would be looking for him and he would not be well hidden in a small town…

The second option – he could head to London, it was only 40 minutes by train and a huge city, he knew there were places there that no one would look for him. Maybe once he had made some money in London and enough time had passed, then he could look to head to a smaller village and make a normal life. Harry knew that both plans would be difficult but they filled him with a sort of hope and determination that he had never really felt before – the idea made him happy. So he weighed up his options and headed towards a train station, bound for London.

A complete lack of money resulted in a semi-voluntary disembarkation of the train, probably a little over half an hour into his trip. To be more specific, he didn't have any money but figured it wouldn't matter because once you made it onto the train, no one ever bothered to check tickets. Of course he must have forgotten that he was Harry Potter, and rules of bad luck just started doing back flips once he got within 50 feet. So, of course, the ticket collector just happened to be present on his train. Luckily though, Harry spotted the man before the man spotted him and managed to get off at the next station before he was found out.

He was so concerned about getting out of the station without being caught he never even looked at what it was called; his paranoia didn't wear off until he was several blocks away from the station. Harry decided to simply continue walking in the direction of the tracks, or what he hoped was the direction of the tracks, until he reached London. He walked and walked and walked, the sun was beginning to go down and he was so tired, he knew he needed to stop for the night, but it seemed ridiculous to simply sleep on the street, which was ironic, because that _had _been his whole plan. It seemed so easy, and he was so tired, just go down an alley and sleep beside a garbage skip, but he couldn't. It didn't matter how tired he was, every alley was too open, too many people would see him, and every time he thought about it he felt eyes on him from everywhere. In his mind it had seemed such an easy thing to do – to sleep on the street, he had never had any delusions about it being warm and comfortable, but neither had he thought for a second that he wouldn't be able to stop.

Harry had been to London before, seen the bums on the street, all they did was sit around all day, he could do this, all he had to do was stop and sit down, he could do this, just turn up that alley and sit down, but he couldn't, people would look at him funny, he couldn't do it. So he pushed on.

Of all the things that would bring his run away plans crashing to the ground, he had not pictured this, but he was having serious doubts… and it was so early. Maybe, he thought, it would just be best if he went back. They'd probably send him to the hospital wing, and he could sleep in a nice bed and in the morning he'd just explain everything to them and they'd… well he didn't know, probably they would forgive him eventually and he could go to school… and hope he didn't get shunned again, because this time he didn't even have Sirius and he'd be really lonely if everyone hated him.

It was then that Harry realised, he'd probably gone for the longest time in a few months, without thinking about the fact that he'd killed his godfather. Which reminded him forcefully, kick-to-the-gut as always, of precisely all the reasons he was doing this. Most of all, because it would make him happy… hopefully… eventually.

So he gritted his teeth, closed his eyes and forced himself to turn down the next alley. It probably wasn't his best idea, closing his eyes and walking into an unknown space. However, he recovered his footing after stumbling over the rusted old washing machine insides; people left the weirdest things lying around, and looked up into a very unexpected sight.

The alley before him did not end in a dirty brick wall and more identical, chalk-perfect houses. It would almost seem to be a street itself, except for the narrow, dark, dankness of it. It was a very long alley, filth ridden and crawling with vermin. No windows overlooked it for view, there were a few, thin, ventilation windows and many air conditioning hubs but it seemed no residents of the perfectly uniformed houses wanted to acknowledge the presence of such a sore sight, so haphazardly close to their unblemished lives. Which surprised Harry, because even from where he had been standing, and he was getting closer to it now, at the end of the alley he could see a thing so beautiful, it rivalled even Hogwarts. It was a garden, he noted, as he crawled his way under the warped and dilapidated wire fence surrounding it, but he had never seen much beauty in the city, he had only ever been into shopping malls, only ever known the straight lines and cleanliness of modern art to be beautiful. Then there was Hogwarts, which was everything so opposite, adored by everyone so opposite to the people from the world he had known… he had always just assumed, that was another difference. Harry had never realised until now, as he walked under huge leafy green oaks, towards a lake surrounded by pink and white bursts of azalea bushes, that there _was_ beauty untamed in the muggle world also – his world. One day he would know that he had stumbled into the Isabella Plantation, this day he was an ignorant runaway in need of a good nights sleep.

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**AN:** Right well this note is a bit longer...

First and foremost - thanks to my reviewers... all 5 of you lol.

Wow this drives me nuts - I'll have an author's note in my head, pestering me the entire time I'm writing the chapter. Then as soon as I actually get up to it I can't remember a darn thing and end up writing something even more useless instead...

ummm... I think the main things I wanted to point out were:

1) I actually tried to sorta do research-like things for this story, so if anyone with any knowledge of London was wanting to critique me... or help me lol, then that advice is appreciated.

2) I don't know if anyone picked up on this, but in this chapter especially I've been trying to portray Harry's thoughts without actually saying that he thought them (does that make any sense?) Basically what I'm saying comes down to the same thing as the homophobia note at the end of the other chapter. The idea is that they are the character's ignorant opinions, that will change or whatever. So I'm not saying bums sit on the street all day, doing nothing, having an easy life - I am trying to establish the fact that Harry is ignorant.

Do you think I spelt that out clearly enough? Probably not... I rarely make sense, I especially doubt I make much sense at 2 am in the morning lol.

Stuff any typos Muhahaha

Katty xx

PS - Did anyone actually end up guessing where this story was going?


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